Thursday, January 29, 2015

Woke up early this morning thinking about blueberries and my garden and my blog, life. My husband thought I might be "tetched" in the head, but it was really a poetic sort of moment. I wanted to be up with the sunrise, planning my blueberry patch for the front yard. I thought about the children's classic, Blueberries for Sal, by Robert McCloskey. My oldest daughter, Julie, is up for a visit ... it would be a good project for our time together!

A good companion - IMHO - for the concept of lawnfree front yards is "edible front yards". Why is this? Yea! It's Soapbox Time! Well, I think it's a quality of life issue ... an enjoying of the space you have to the max. Just like creating a gathering spot to enjoy the sunset (or your neighbors' company), or, creating a native plant border that invite native polinators to share your bounty, doing the right thing, enhances all areas of life. Especially as contrasted with it's opposite: tired, mostly weedy lawns, shrubs that were installed 20 years ago. Why is it there??? It just is.

So, I address this subject while there's still time to buy, plant, pick, enjoy!

Key Points:

South/North:

It used to be that blueberries were limited to northern climates. They needed abundant "chill hours" and those of us in California and the southern states didn't get enough of those. I first started hearing about "southern" highbush blueberries, maybe 20 years ago ... around when they started showing up in the nurseries.

Evergreen:

A blueberry's version of evergreen, is a "sort of" thing, like our roses that seem to never go really dormant. The value of this is that they continue to contribute the green-ness factor throughout the winter season. I don't believe in stripping our front yards of all vegetation come November and December in the name of lawn-free. If one can do something to blend in one's front yard with the neighbor's, I think it will be appreciated. Much more so than the dried-out, summer's gone, native yards that is often see. Not pretty. But blueberries have their own garden design value - spring blooms, colorful leaves in the fall, and their lingering, "evergreen-ness".

We have a great resource for organic fruits and berries and growing supplies here in the Sacramento Valley ... Peaceful Valley Nursery, located in Grass Valley. They have wonderful videos on just about every topic. Here's what Trisha has to say about planting and growing blueberries:

Blueberries and Pizza at High Hand Nursery in Loomis

Southern Highbush Blueberry are on sale. My man and I went up and had breakfast in their cafe this last weekend. They currently have a 2 for 1 sale on 2-gallon Sharpblues! ($20 for 2 blueberry plants.) I plan to scoot up there to buy a few, and, perhaps have some of their Outdoor Pizza Oven pizza, or their tri-tip with blue cheese sandwich. It's yum! As for the blueberries ... if you're going to get them, this is the weekend!!! (More about their Sharpblues)